Shaming in the media - School Kids vs Native Americans

[dowie]

Don't know if anyone saw this earlier, the story has gone viral on social media and has had coverage on CNN, the BBC etc... I'm not really a fan of claims the "MSM" is biased etc.. but this time they're shooting themselves in the foot and just playing into the narrative from the likes of Trump that they're "Fake news CNN" etc...

The main stream narrative here is that a load of *racist* white Trump supporters abused and mocked a peaceful Native American war veteran who was fearful of his own safety when among them and thought they were all hateful etc...

tl:dr

The kids had been on a "pro life" march - cringe, but I guess that is Catholics/right wingers for you

The kids were abused for a while by a group of African American "Israelites" who shouted racial slurs and homophobic abuse. The Israelites also mocked the native American's religion, claimed they were indigenous too. CNN, rather comically, has referred to these protestors as "young African Americans who had been preaching the bible nearby"

The kids started their school chat and were approached by some native Americans. One told the kids to **** off back to Europe another got in the kids faces and started banging his drum at them... one of the kids stood his ground and smiled at him, others smirked... they're now all hateful etc.. for doing so.

Seems a tad unfair that plenty of outlets are only showing one side of the story and demonising the kids, it is counter productive too as when the full footage is available on youtube etc.. and a bunch of youtubers are happy to show all the things CNN etc.. omitted it just plays into the narrative that the main stream news isn't trustworthy.

Here is the CNN article:

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/19/us/teens-mock-native-elder-trnd/index.html

here is a response from one of the students:

https://twitter.com/AClementsWKRC/status/1086822521012473858

and here are some videos:

Warning there are a couple of swear words but not excessive given the length of the videos AFAIK, please delete if not appropriate.

full video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQyBHTTqb38

 

[dowie]

I wont bother too much with this thread, but their school is apparently "well known" for being very fundamentalist, seemingly a lot of crimes occur around it/due to it. Regardless, i'm not American and won't pretend that this means anything to me.

The point wasn’t so much that some event in the US should mean anything to you but rather the way the mainstream media chose to cover it and then potentially score an own goal after various youtubers show what actually happened. This story was covered by CNN, the BBC etc..

It isn’t that anyone should care about the particular story itself or these kids but rather that events like this that get twisted by those reporting them just feed into the narrative that say “CNN is fake news” etc... Distrust of mainstream news in favour of social media, YouTube etc... is something that is affecting various sides in politics and it probably isn’t a good thing.

 

[dowie]

And if the news was 100% accurate, they still wouldn't care. So what's the point? Some people are just lost to rationality, the News may aswell just go for the hits now.

We're in the stupid era and it ain't stopping for nobody.

Who's is they? This doesn't just affect some small portion of Trump or Brexit voters. Distrust of the media isn't a good thing in general and stuff like this just feeds into that narrative.

 

[dowie]

I include overzealous idiots of all persuasions, nationalist ones just annoy me more.

OK but the point is still the same, it doesn't just affect them.

 

[dowie]

Is distrust of the media arguably not a good thing these days when it has been shown time and again all media outlets are not reporting news impartially, but instead peddling the agenda of whoever their paymaster is.

It's a sad state of affairs we cannot trust them to be impartial but we should no longer trust that, whatever side of the debate they sit.

Well not it isn't necessarily, I'd much rather the likes of the BBC and CNN had a bit more integrity when initially reporting these sorts of things instead of jumping on the bandwagon, slanting things in favour of identity politics - in reality there was a group of "Israelites" shouting out racist and homophobic slurs, there were some adult native Americans trying to intimidate some school boys, including telling them to **** off back to Europe and there were ether kids, some of them bemused by the crazy Native American man squaring up and drumming/chanting in people's faces... the focus of the story became some random teenager the native randomly chose to square up to and his horrible crime seems to have been - smirking, being white and having right wing political views....

This **** storm then caused countless celebs etc.. to condemn him, demand action from the school etc..etc.. No focus in the story on the people being openly racist, they were briefly mentioned by CNN as African Americans who were preaching the bible nearby. No questioning of the Native American's version of events, no commentary from the side of the boys etc.. there have since been some edits to the stories though the Native American guy who blatantly lied about the whole thing isn't being called out and the kids are still the focus of it all.

This then became an easy takedown for various youtubers - the problem here is that in a lot of other cases the likes of the BBC, CNN etc.. are absolutely fine as sources of news... however if they keep on undermining trust in their content then more people will be driven more towards alternative media - when you've got people watching the likes of RT or InfoWars or random youtubers (and of course once you start down that rabbit hole youtube just recommends more of the same content) you can end up with a rather narrow perspective on the world.

This is applicable not just to right wing types but all sorts of views.... for an example of some of the crazy reactions to this on social media, apparently simply smirking, while being white, is "racist" - this is a post that has been shared a few thousand times - it is nuts, though the MSM have fed this... the poster acknowledges that the boy didn't shout, rage, threaten or even lift a finger... yet the boy is the racist one apparently because he smiled/smirked when someone approached him and squared up.



this is from a blue checkmark person on twitter - another claim that smirking is apparently "Racist"

 

[dowie]

Maajid Nawaz has highlighted some very dubious twitter reactions, I suspect twitter might be keener to shut down accounts if the political views were different and these sorts of sentiments were shared - especially dodgy that these people have the special blue tick...

 

[dowie]

The "we should kill them all" rhetoric of the left towards these falsely accused kids is similar to the type of hysteria that happens in countries where genocide occurs (mainly communist/socialist countries).

Yeah it is pretty dubious... it also shows up some social media platforms as being a bit of a farce - prominent controversial figures who are anti the current SJW narrative can get banned or demonetised relatively easily for apparently breaking the rules - for example that Milo guy, he criticised the female ghostbusters movie and insulted Leslie Jones, though he didn't break any rules in doing so... however because some of his followers apparently abused her then he got banned.

On the other hand you've got some of these SJW types complete with blue ticks on their profiles and they've seemingly been allowed to make statements related to carrying out violent acts against some school kids and they're still free to post away.

 

[dowie]

In respect of the aforementioned twitter posts, I don’t actually read twitter or any news that stems from it as it demonstrably (and perpetually) utter twaddle. I don’t think virtually anyone on there that is quoted in the media has a point of view that comes close to reasonable. It can be ignored, I think.

The point re: the twitter posts was more about the seemingly inconsistent approach to enforcing their rules. These platforms are influential whether you're interested in them or not, we'd perhaps not have had an a decent objection to the original narrative in this particular story for example if not for the ability of people to upload footage on youtube, share on twitter etc.. and show how there was so much missing from the initial reporting of events.

 

[dowie]

Don't know if anyone saw this earlier, the story has gone viral on social media and has had coverage on CNN, the BBC etc... I'm not really a fan of claims the "MSM" is biased etc.. but this time they're shooting themselves in the foot and just playing into the narrative from the likes of Trump that they're "Fake news CNN" etc...

just to bring this thread back up and re: them not doing themselves any favours on that case - it seems CNN has been the first media company to settle a law suit over its "fake news" coverage of these boys:

https://www.fox19.com/2020/01/07/cnn-settles-lawsuit-with-nick-sandmann/

Sandmann’s lawsuit sought $800 million from CNN, the Washington Post and NBC Universal.

Trial dates are still not set for Sandmann’s lawsuit against NBC Universal and the Washington Post.

The Washington Post suit sought $250 million. A federal judge let a portion of the suit go forward after The Post filed a motion to dismiss it.

Obvs I doubt he got anywhere near the headline amount asked for.

Incidentally, there was a rather shocking murder of a university student in NYC recently, got some right wingers angry (presumably because the killers were black, victim white etc..) - but the interesting thing was that various publications chose not to name the teen arrested over it (not out of any legal requirement not to but just on the basis that he was a minor).

Seems very dubious - if they can frame you as privileged, white and (most importantly) having the wrong political views then minor or not you can be both named and shamed in the media and various lies/exaggerations told about you for something that wasn't even a crime. They know full well that they can attempt to ruin this kid's life etc.. because of how he reacted, when approached by a weird old guy banging a drum in his face while waiting for a bus on a school trip. Who cares if he they gets death threats and most of the blue checkmark types on twitter are all over him, they've got advertising to sell and distorting this case makes for plenty of clickbait.

Kill a university student and well, you're a minor (and importantly not a trump supporter or perceived to be privileged)... best keep your name out of it and actually be responsible journalists who stick to a set of guidelines etc...